Christopher Cardinal v. John Lupo, 20-16364

Plaintiff-appellant Christopher Cardinal sued defendant John Lupo on a tort claim and obtained a $250,000 jury verdict.
Cardinal moved to recover contractual attorney’s fees and costs; the underlying contract included an attorney-fees clause but did not define “prevailing party.”
Cardinal had sought substantially larger sums (over $1.58 million in a post-trial motion and a $1.75 million settlement demand), making the verdict a small fraction of his objectives.
The district court denied Cardinal’s request for attorney’s fees (finding no prevailing party under California law) and denied costs based on Cardinal’s “marginal success” and the closeness/difficulty of the issues.
Cardinal appealed; the Ninth Circuit reviewed legal questions de novo and discretionary rulings for abuse of discretion, and affirmed both denials.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Entitlement to contractual attorney's fees	Cardinal: $250,000 is a net monetary recovery; § 1032 makes him the prevailing party entitled to fees	Lupo: Contract lacks a prevailing-party definition; prevailing-party inquiry uses California's pragmatic test; Cardinal did not substantially achieve his objectives	Court: Apply California’s “substantial achievement” (pragmatic) test; Cardinal did not prevail; denial of fees affirmed
Entitlement to taxable costs	Cardinal: Award shows case was not close; costs should be awarded	Lupo: Cardinal’s success was marginal; closeness/difficulty justify denying costs	Court: District court did not abuse discretion; denial of costs for marginal success/issue difficulty affirmed

Santisas v. Goodin, 17 Cal.4th 599 (1998) (adopts a pragmatic, equitable test for who is a "prevailing party")
Hsu v. Abbara, 9 Cal.4th 863 (1995) (prevailing-party inquiry compares relief awarded to litigation objectives)
Gil v. Mansano, 121 Cal.App.4th 739 (2004) (contractual fee recovery depends on who "prevailed" under the contract)
Maynard v. BTI Grp., Inc., 216 Cal.App.4th 984 (2013) (discusses interplay between Santisas pragmatic test and § 1032)
Khavarian Enters. v. Commline, Inc., 216 Cal.App.4th 310 (2013) (§ 1032 is not automatically the default definition of "prevailing party" for contractual fees)
Mountain Air Enters., LLC v. Sundowner Towers, LLC, 3 Cal.5th 744 (2017) (rejects overly formalistic approaches to prevailing-party determinations)
Olive v. Gen. Nut. Ctrs., Inc., 30 Cal.App.5th 804 (2018) (mixed results or fractional recovery can justify denial of fee awards)
San Francisco CDC LLC v. Webcor Constr. L.P., 62 Cal.App.5th 266 (2021) (standards for reviewing legal basis for fee awards)
Ass'n of Mexican Am. Educators v. California, 231 F.3d 572 (9th Cir. 2000) (trial court must state reasons for denying costs)
Draper v. Rosario, 836 F.3d 1072 (9th Cir. 2016) (factors district courts may consider when denying costs)
A.G. v. Paradise Valley Unified Sch. Dist. No. 69, 815 F.3d 1195 (9th Cir. 2016) (abuse-of-discretion standard for costs rulings)